The Nursing and Midwifery Council

The complainant submitted three requests to The Nursing and Midwifery Council (‘the NMC’) seeking information about nurse and midwife referrals. The NMC relied on section 12(4) of FOIA (aggregated costs) to refuse the requests.The Commissioner’s decision is that, as the NMC has first failed to comply with the requirements of section 12(1) of FOIA (estimate the cost of complying with the requests), it was therefore not entitled to rely on 12(4) of FOIA to refuse the requests. The Commissioner also finds that the NMC failed to provide reasonable advice and assistance and therefore did not meet its obligations under section 16(1) of FOIA. The Commissioner requires the NMC to issue a fresh response that does not rely on section 12 of FOIA.